The Influence of Employee Satisfaction on Employees’ Creativity: A

Case Study at Higher Education

Dian Anggraini Kusumajati

Character Building Development Center and Information System Department, Bina Nusantara University, Jakarta 11480,

Indonesia

Keyword: Employee satisfaction, creativity, employee

Abstract: Job satisfaction is inseparable from the creativity of employees in terms of improving the quality of the

college. In connection with this, the purpose of this study aims to measure employees’ satisfaction and

creativity. The subject population in this study includes employees at the center and departments located at

Bina Nusantara University. The research applied purposive sampling. The instrument of this study is based

on the scale, which consists of two questionnaires to measure job satisfaction and creativity. Based on data

processing, this research resulted in good job satisfaction. Participants of this study were 67 employees (20

males, 47 females, M

age

=38 years) from Bina Nusantara University Jakarta through purposive sampling

technique. The results showed that the employee satisfaction has contributed to creativity 48.1% and the

remaining 51.9% by other factors to satisfaction. The conclusions of the study indicated that employees

have a high creativity because of the influence of employee satisfaction special in relationships with

colleagues and working conditions. The highest creativity aspect of employees is expertise, where

employees perform the expertise in their respective fields. Job satisfaction contributes a good effect that is

equal to 48.1% towards employee creativity.

1 INTRODUCTION

Bina Nusantara University is an educational

institution, established for more than 30 years. In

this context, the long journey of improving the

quality of a universityis inseparable from the role of

human resources. At a closer look, human resources

are the driving force of institutions. At the same

time, it serves as the main factors because the

existence of institutions depends on the individual’s

involvement.

Osborn (as cited in Muhaimin, 2004) states that

job satisfaction represents the degree of positive or

negative feelings of a person in terms of tasks of

work, occupational work, and relationships among

workers. In this line, various observable employees’

characteristics based on attitude, behavior,

perspective, and situation at work reflects job

satisfaction. Job satisfaction is in the capacity of the

decline in productivity, strikes, absenteeism, and

employee turnover. Other possible symptoms of an

employee include the disreputable work

performance, lack of discipline, deficient results

obtained from performance (Triyanto and Santosa,

2009).

The attitude of employees reflects job

satisfaction by displaying feelings of pleasure

towards one’s work. In this setting, feelings of

pleasure displayed by employees will have a positive

impact so that employees become more productive,

vibrant and emerge the creativity. In this point of

entry, job satisfaction can encourage employees to

be creative (Kumar, 2013).

This form of creativity derived from innovation.

Robbins (1990) states that in order to face

competition and succeed, the company must

innovate. According to Amabile (Amabile, 1996), all

innovations originate from a creative idea. In an

organizational life (Mc. Lean, 2005), creativity plays

an important role in society. The organization is a

business that brings creativity through innovative

products and services desired by customers by using

creative ideas to meet the needs of the community

and to create jobs so as to improve the quality of

life.This study intends to test whether the influence

of creativity on job satisfaction and creativity that

Kusumajati, D.

The Inﬂuence of Employee Satisfaction on Employees’ Creativity: A Case Study at Higher Education.

DOI: 10.5220/0009999200002917

In Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Social Sciences, Laws, Arts and Humanities (BINUS-JIC 2018), pages 16-22

ISBN: 978-989-758-515-9

needs to be developed to improve the quality of the

college.

Base on the description above that the author

hypothesized “there is any influences between

employee satisfaction and creativity” (H1) and

“identifying employees’ satisfaction dimension

which has an impacton creativity that can improve

the quality of college” (H2).

1.1 Employee Satisfaction

Job satisfaction represents the feelings of employees

in their work or work situation (Jex, 2002). In this

spectrum, job satisfaction is defined as to what

extent individuals perceive positively or negatively

of various factors or dimensions based on tasks in

their work (Hariandja, 2002). Alam and Mohammad

define job satisfaction as the attitude that individuals

have about work.

Job satisfaction tends to be individual. Each

individual will have different levels of satisfaction in

accordance with the value system that applies to one.

This is due to the differences in the individual

(Prabu, 2005). Job satisfaction reflects merely what

is perceived as their work and different aspects of

the job. It symbolizes the extent to which people like

(satisfaction) or dislike (discontent) the work

(Spector, 1997).

Job satisfaction delineates the emotional states

of a person's evaluation of someone’s work

experience. Job dissatisfaction occurs when the

experience is not in accordance with the expectation.

For example, an employee expects a clean and safe

working condition, yet it occurs on the contrary such

as the dirty and insecure of workplace (Mathis and

Jackson, 2008).

Hence, it can be concluded that job satisfaction

is an emotional reaction that includes positive-

negative feelings, attitudes, judgments and thoughts

of employees on jobs where employee’s satisfaction

or dissatisfaction arises when employees work at the

workplace.

1.2 Influenced Factors of Job

Satisfaction

Generally, a myriad of factors can affect the level of

employee satisfaction, namely: personality,

relationships with colleagues, relationships with

superiors, conditions of work, work location, and the

work itself.

Personality (Bisen and Priya, 2010) is defined as

a dynamic organization within the individual of the

psychological system governing the uniqueness of

the individual in adapting to the environment

(Kondallkar, 2007). There is an individual

relationship to job satisfaction. In this entry, it serves

to improve the ability of employees to achieve the

targeted results. The more appropriate the

personality of an employee to a job the more

employees become satisfied. In this case, family

relationships, religious influence, ethnicity, and

educational background affect the personality,

nature and behavior of these employees (Jabeen,

Mishra, Singh and Ali, 2009). As stated by Ayan

and Kocacik (Ayan and Kocacik, 2010), an

extroverted personality (taking risks from work,

active, and assignment) has a relationship with job

satisfaction. In this direction, personality contributes

a very important influence on perception, work

evaluation, and environment because someone's

behavior becomes part of the interaction that occurs

between the environment and other living.

Relationship with colleagues. Satisfaction with

colleagues is a perceived dimension of job

satisfaction that determines how an employee can

perceive his or her accomplishment by the support,

attitude, or behavior of co-workers such as

selfishness, friendliness and support (Purnani and

Sahadev, 2008). The higher the intensity of

relationships with colleagues, the higher the

employee’s job satisfaction. On that basis,

coworkers can be a place to communicate with each

other between employees who have an important

position in reducing stress levels (Aprizal, Kuntjoro

and Probandari, 2008).

Relationships with superiors. Superior is

someone who always provides instructions or order

in the implementation of work (Hariandja, 2002).

The behavior of the superior who lack appreciation

for employee’s performance, emotional, less flexible

and input, less fair and wise, will have an impact on

motivation and job satisfaction. Such superior

behavior can even lead to employees having a desire

to exit and ultimately can disrupt organizational

effectiveness (Wijayanti, 2009).

Working conditions. In a condition of narrow

space, hot temperature, dazzling lights, and

unfavorable working conditions, it will cause

employee a reluctance to work. Employees will find

reasons to escape from workspace (Munandar,

2001). In this token, the more comfortable the

working conditions are in the places that will get

richer. In parallel, the employee encounters

obstacles to improve the quality of work, motivation,

and career (Triyanto and Santosa, 2009) if the

company pay no attention to the conditions in which

the employee works.

The Inﬂuence of Employee Satisfaction on Employees’ Creativity: A Case Study at Higher Education

The work (Shajahan and Shajahan, 2004; Laily,

2009) job characteristics are employees' perceptions

of the characteristics contained in a job or the nature

of tasks that include the authority and extent of

responsibility of various tasks carried by employees.

The more appropriate the characteristics of

employee work, the higher the employee job

satisfaction. Employees, who have variations in

work, get involved in a job. Moreover, the

employees have the freedom to work. As the result,

it will increase work productivity and produce

satisfaction in work (Amabile, 1999).

Based on various research results from the

influence of job satisfaction, the researcher

concluded that job satisfaction has influence on (1)

personality, (2) relationship with coworkers, (3)

relationship with superiors, (4) work conditions, and

(5) the job itself.

1.3 The Fundamentals of Creativity

Creativity and innovation according to Angle (Mc.

Lean, 2005) hold strongly overlapping

interrelationships in various characteristics.

However, Amabile (Sternberg, 1999) states that all

innovation initiates with a creative idea. Creativity is

a novel, unique and beneficial idea, especially at an

individual level. While innovation is a successful

implementation process of creative ideas in the

organization. Sternberg (Antonites, 2003) defines

creativity as the ability to produce good and new

works (original, unexpected) and precise (useful,

adaptable to task constraints). In this line, creativity

includes ideas, inventions and breakthroughs. While

innovation is the process of developing and

implementing new ideas.

According to Amabile, (Sternberg, 1999)

creativity is the result of original, useful ideas,

solutions or products in work situations. Creativity is

also a product quality, process and individual.

Findlay and Lumsden (Okpara, 2007) define a

creative individual as someone who possesses the

ability to solve problems in situations where the

context of the problem and its interpretation are

unclear.

The result of creative thinking is defined as a

creative product. According to Cauger (as cited in

Okpara, 2007), there are five things that affect

creativity in creating new products, i.e. idea

generation, idea development, discovery, invention,

and innovation.

Based on several definitions of creativity,

researchers conclude that creativity is the ability to

generate ideas, unique, creative ideas as part of

originality and useful in work situations.

1.4 The Components of Individual

Creativity Generator

According to Amabile (Amabile, 1996), creative

individuals own three component models, i.e. skill,

creative thinking ability, and motivation.

Importantly, the combined togetherness includes

creativity, creative skills, and motivation.

First, expertise (Amabile, 1996) deals with

technical knowledge, procedural and intellectual

aspects. Expertise (Coveney, 2008) includes

everything one knows and capable to do in one's

field or someone’s knowledge and technical

abilities.

Second, creative thinking skills (Amabile, 1996)

encompasses the entire cognitive process such as

inspiration, imagination, thought and the

combination of new ideas with previous ideas.

Creative thinking skills (Coveney, 2008) refers to

the way to approach the problems and solutions, the

ability to put existing ideas together into new

combinations. The skill itself depends on the

personality as well as about how people think and

work.

Third, motivation (Amabile, 1996) is the desire

or motivation to create something new (intrinsic

motivation). Motivation (Coveney, 2008) is the

driving force and desire to undertake something,

desire and interest from inside employees.

Employees engage in their work for those challenges

and pleasures if people are intrinsically motivated.

The work itself is motivating. People will be most

creative at mixing motivated words primarily by

interest, satisfaction and challenge itself, working

with the heart, loving their work, the enjoyment of

seeing and finding outstanding solutions that

become a breakthrough.

1.5 Influenced Factors of Creativity

Amabile (Sternberg, 1999) states that the creative

process is influenced by internal and external

factors. According to Mc. Lean (Mc. Lean, 2005),

creativity emerges at the individual level. In this

line, variables related to creativity include the

personality, motivation, and expertise. In addition,

environmental factors that affect creativity are the

level of groups and organizations, including

organizational and organizational climate. Matishen

and Einarsen (Amabile, 2012) states that the quality

of the work environment can impact the level of

BINUS-JIC 2018 - BINUS Joint International Conference

creativity and innovation of an organization. In that

way, the organizational environment (Amabile,

Barsade, Mueller and Staw, 2005) that stimulates

creativity includes positive challenges, team

collaboration, freedom at work, top management

support in creativity. Meanwhile, the concerns that

hinder creativity include critiques of ideas,

organizational politics, conservative culture, and

unwillingness to take risks from top management

and deadline pressures.

Amabile (Satiadarma, 2004) states that positive

effects have a positive effect on creativity on the

organization. Creativity may be particularly

vulnerable to affective influences, especially since

positive effects lead to the kind of cognitive

variation that stimulates creativity. For example,

Isen (Eisenberger & Shanock, 2003) states that

positive effects have three major effects on cognitive

activity. First, positive effects make the additional

cognitive material available to cultivate and increase

the number of cognitive elements to associate.

Second, it leads to the focus of attention and more

complex on the cognitive context; increase the

extent of the relevant elements dealing with the

problem. Third, it increases cognitive flexibility and

the likelihood that diverse interconnected cognitive

elements. These three processes cause positive

effects on creativity.

According to Amabile (Mc. Lean, 2005),

intrinsic motivation can increase creativity.

According to Brockman, intrinsic motivation

(Kumari, 2013) serves to focus attention directly on

the task itself rather than other factors. Task-focused

attention can lead to greater awareness of the task's

own details and the complexity of the inherent task.

In contrast, a lower level of creativity results from

an extrinsic motivation. This is because of attention

to tasks shifts to extrinsic goals. Awards can

enhance intrinsic motivation and creativity (Black,

2009).

From several factors above, the researcher

concludes that (a) expertise, (b) creative thinking,

and (c) motivation can influence creativity.

2 METHODS

The variables in the study consist of the independent

and dependent variable. In this setting, employee

satisfactionrepresents the independent variable and

employee creativityreflects the dependent variable.

2.1 Research Hypothesis and Population

Participants of this study were 67 employees (20

males, 47 females, M

age

=38 years) from Bina

Nusantara University Jakarta through purposive

sampling technique. The employee satisfaction

signified a fair influence i.e. 4.81% toward the

creativity of the employee. The hypothesis of the

research is “There is an influence onemployee

satisfaction and employee creativity. The study was

conducted at Bina Nusantara University. The

population in the study involved 67 employees in the

various division.

2.2 Measurement Tools

Research implemented a scale to measure the

employee satisfaction and employee creativity (1).

Data achieved are generated using SPSS for

Windows version 16. The measuring tools of

employee satisfaction were prepared by researchers.

Employee Satisfaction measurement consisted of 5

aspects, namely personality, relationship with

colleagues, relationship with supervisor, working

condition, and its job self. Employee satisfaction

measurement consisted of 37 statements; (2)

employee creativity. Data achieved are generated

using SPSS for Windows version 16. The measuring

tools of employee creativity were prepared by

researchers. Employee creativity measurement

consisted of 3 aspects, namely expertise, creative

thinking, and motivation. Employee creativity

consisted of 28 statements.

2.3 Data Analysis Methods

The research applied statistical analysis. The

technique of sampling is purposive sampling.

Purposive sampling is a non-probability sampling

method. It signified that components opted for the

sample is selected by the researcher’s deliberation.

Researchers obtained a sample by using a sound

consideration, which is cost-effective and cost-

efficient. The correlation analysis result between

factors applied validity and reliability test. Valid

items were solely analyzed.

The Inﬂuence of Employee Satisfaction on Employees’ Creativity: A Case Study at Higher Education

Table 1: Employee satisfaction.

Dimension

Emplo

ee Satisfaction

Total 67 71.00 132.00 105.000 15.22249

Personalit

67 17.00 28.00 21.925 2.53282

Relationship with collea

ues 67 16.00 28.00 21.970 2.70224

Relationship with superviso

67 10.00 20.00 14.731 2.10038

Workin

Condition 67 20.00 40.00 29.078 3.99140

Job its self 67 12.00 28.00 21.238 2.60006

3 RESULT AND DISCUSSION

The questionnaire is organized based on the Likert

scale, using 4 statements that strongly disagree

(STS), Disagree (TS), Disagree (S), and strongly

agree (SS). Reliability testing of the measuring

instrument (1) employee satisfaction comprised of

five aspects of a good internal consistency. Based on

reliability test, the results depicted that Cronbach

alpha for personality (0,802), relationship with

colleagues (0,824), relationship with supervisor

(0,775), working condition (0,835), and its job self

(0,821); (2) employee creativity tool consisted of 3

aspects i.e. expertise, creative thinking, and

motivation. The questionnaire is organized based on

the Likert scale, using 4 statements that strongly

disagree (STS), Disagree (TS), Disagree (S), and

strongly agree (SS). Reliability test result of the

measuring instrument for expertise (0,882), creative

thinking (0,822), and motivation (0,805).

Based on the descriptive analysis, an overview of

the results indicated the lowest employee

satisfaction score was 71.00 and the highest score is

132.00. The average employee satisfaction of the

participant is 105.000 with a standard deviation of

15.22. Based on the description of participants’

perspectives, employee satisfactionis determined by

working condition, relationship with colleagues,

personality, and the jobitsself-aspects which score

posited the highest as shown in Table I.

Based on the descriptive analysis, an overview of

the results indicated the lowest employee creativity

score was 72.00 and the highest score is 110.00. The

average employee satisfaction of the participant is

87.806 with a standard deviation of 8.523. Based on

the description of participants’ perspectives,

creativityis determined by expertiseand motivation

aspects which score posited the highest as shown in

Table 2.

Based on the normality test results on employee

satisfaction variable and the creativity variables

indicated that the variables on the distribution of

employee satisfaction coefficient with the normality

of 0.927 and its significance of 0.357 (p> 0.05),

whereas on the distribution of the variable of 1.464

creativity significance of 0.026 (p> 0.05). Spearmen

Correlation analysis was used as the subsequent step

following the result of the normality test.

The analysis results of the coefficient correlation

(r) of employee satisfaction (r

. = 639, p = 0.01)

have a correlation with the creativity. The results of

data analysis data denoted that p = 0.00 (p< 0.01)

that expressed a positive relationship between the

employee satisfaction with creativity. Researchers

applied a regression test with a total score of

employee satisfaction as a dependent variable in

Table 3 to evaluate to what extent the influence of

an accomplished creativity and employee

satisfaction. Employee satisfaction affected variance

of creativity of 48.1%, F = 18.825, p<0.01, (β =

0.587, p< 0.01). The participant who possessed high

creativity tends to be predisposed to positive

employee satisfaction.

Table 2: Employee creativity.

Component N Min Max M SD

Creativity_Total 67 72.00 110.00 87.806 8.52312

Expertise 67 20.00 40.00 30.791 3.50557

Creative Thinking 67 23.00 36.00 28.164 2.71693

Motivation 67 24.00 35.00 28.851 2.94008

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Table 3: Influence of employee satisfaction and creativity.

Variable R R

Sig

(2-tailed)

Employee

Satisfaction

.693 .481 .000

4 CONCLUSION AND

SUGGESTION

Based on the results of the study, the employee has

high creativity due to the influence of the employee

satisfaction especially on personality, relationship

with colleagues, and work condition aspect. The

highest creativity aspect isexpertise which the

employees have capabilities in their respective

fields. Theemployee satisfaction has a good

influence on creativity. Based on the description of

employee satisfaction can be seen the aspect

personality, relationship with colleagues and work

condition are higher than other aspects of job

satisfaction. The conclusion that the influence of

personality, relationship with colleagues and

working conditions have a correlation with creativity

in work.

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